Predictions for ONE Championship 157- Grappling Highlights

Last updated on 17.05.2022 by

On May 20, 2022 at ONE Championship 157 there will be a pair of exciting grappling matches that Jiu Jiteros shouldn’t miss. Early this year ONE signed contracts with some of the most elite Grappling competitors in the world and organized grappling matches in several of their events. 

In March 2022 the young ATOS stars, Tye and Kade Ruotolo signed with ONE Championship to participate in both Grappling and MMA, and will make their debut this Friday against two of the organization’s best grapplers: Garry Tonon and Shinya Aoki. 

Another Jiu Jitsu standout on the card is the 13 time IBJJF Black Belt World Champion Marcus ‘Buchecha’ Almeida who is fighting in his 3rd MMA match. 

ONE Championship Grappling Rules

While the UFC is known for only hosting MMA matches, ONE offers a variety of fighting styles, each with their own rules. The Ruotolo brothers are making their debut under ONE’s grappling ruleset, although they have also signed contracts which allow for MMA matches in the future.

The matches will consist of one 12 minute long match. Unlike ADCC or IBJJF the matches are submission only with no points awarded to athletes. If a match ends without a submission the criteria for selecting the winner will be the number of submission attempts.

Kade Ruotolo vs Shinya Aoki

Kade Ruotolo vs Shinya Aoki

The first grappling match of the evening is the match between the always entertaining Atos prodigy Kade Routolo and the very aggressive and dangerous submission hunter Shinya Aoki. 

One of the best Jiu Jitsu competitors to come out of Japan, the veteran Black Belt Aoki holds an incredible 30 submission wins in his record and is a thought challenge for anyone with his submission hunting style. But he is facing one of the best, if not the best light weights in the Jiu Jitsu scene right now. 

Having a very complete style, Kade has won some of the biggest events in professional grappling in the past two years including the first ADCC North American trials, Who’s Number One Lightweight Grand Prix, and a lot of super fights in the top no-gi organizations around the world (Polaris, Grapplefest, WNO, and many more). 

In 2021 Kade Ruotolo was even nominated by Flograppling for the “Best Grappler of the year.” While Kade will need to be careful, he is an obvious pick for the win.

Prediction: Kade Ruotolo by darce choke

Tye Ruotolo vs Garry Tonon

Tye Ruotolo vs Garry Tonon

The second grappling match in the card pits two ADCC vets against one another: Tye Ruotolo (Kade’s twin brother) against American grappling star Garry Tonon.

Tonon signed with ONE Championship in 2018 and in March 2022 fought for the MMA Featherweight title where he suffered his first defeat. Holding a very impressive resume in Jiu Jitsu and grappling, Garry is a two time IBJJF No-Gi World Champion, 5 time EBI Champion and a ADCC World Championship Bronze medalist. 

Now returning to professional grappling since his departure in 2019, Tonon is scheduled to face one of the most talented and well rounded young stars: Tye Ruotolo. Ruotolo became the youngest entrant in ADCC history when in 2019 he got invited as a late replacement to the ADCC World Championship. 

In this breakout debut he made it all the way to the Semi-Finals and competed for the bronze medal where he lost to World Champion Paulo Myao – all that at the age of 15! Since then Tye has had dominant performances across a wide range of competitions. 

His recent wins include the Who’s Number One Middleweight Grand Prix , the IBJJF World Championship as a Brown Belt (after training Gi for only two weeks) where he submitted all of his opponents including his twin brother Kade in the final, and numbers of super fights in the top organizations around the world (WNO, Polaris , GrapplerFest and many more). 

For the upcoming ADCC World Championship in September, 2022 both athletes got invited by the ADCC, with Ruotolo in the 88 kg division and Garry to his original weight class 77 kg. The question ask by many is will Tye’s fast paced game be to much for Tonon, or will the crafty vet find his way to a sneaky submission?

Prediction: Tye Ruotolo win by decision